Argosy All-Story Weekly, April 16, 1921 — page 93: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

84 With a gasp of relief that was like the sob of a child who has been held in fear- thrall, she read about his taking Switches. He had not meant to steal the pony. The man in the house was not dead or going to die. Switches was back. Dewilde unconsciously counted on her fingers as she tabulated the crimes of which her disturb- ing guest was not guilty. Two counts against him were checked off. But the other, his inhuman desertion of Mr. Nemo, his dastardly use of the old ’ gcientist’s agony for his own ends. It was more barbarous than either of the others. She told herself slowly he was not a mur- derer; he was not a horse-thief. He was— a brute. And Morgan Martin, with two guns and an aim almost perfect in its deadly accu- racy, was on the train with the brute. GHAPTER XI. THE SNOW-PLOW GANG. HE brute was trudging westward along a route that led exactly away from the pursuer who was disgruntledly rolling eastward. And the trudging was work. . But Wharton had thought cannily of what had happened. Some one was aiter him. The one reason any one could have for sniping at him was what he had done to Clayton. He.«realized that he was a hunted man and must bury his identity till he could get quite beyond the country where his culminating misfortune had over- taken him. He had trudged stolidly along the track for hours. It seemed to him that an end- less night just dragged and dragged and dragged itself on. He lost the power to re- member anything but night. He could not anticipate. It was still dark when he saw ahead of him the flare of light on snow. He stopped, for the instant contemplating a roundabout way to avoid men and the menace they represented. Then he caught up his stampeding senses. Was he to dodge and duck the rest of his life? Display of fear would draw to him ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. the very attention and the suspicion he dreaded. He had seen it happen. Bracing to meet, with all of the power of his keen wit and the strength of his muscles, whatever it was that stood there in his route, he moved noiselessly ahead. - “You got yer chanst; an’ you ain’t got the nerve to take it!”’ It seemed as if the shadows were talking to him. Wharton paused and listened. “T ain’t so sure he’s got the pay-envel- ope on him!” another voice observed. Wharton knew then that he was listening to a conversation that did not concern him in the least. Yet he stood still and waited: It was too strange a place for a conference and the time too unusual for him to pass by. “T tell you I seen the express-agent of that train give it to him. I heard him say what it was. What more d’ye want?” “Well, ain’t we waited here all night fur him to go to Ellsworth?” the other asked. “Yep, we have. But seems like he ain’t went,” the first voice admitted. “An’ they ain’t no use tryin’ to git me to pull off anything raw right among the bunch!” “Seems zif he’d git to Ellsworth in time to git back by mornin’!” the first voice grumbled. “Say, mates, you’ll get in worse than you’ve ever been if you fool with any pay- envelopes!” Wharton’s voice came like a thunder-clap to the two men who had believed them- selves safe from being overheard. They stood for a brief instant, dumfounded. Then, with a unanimity that showed they believed themselves in the power of some one they must put beyond hurting them, they “ rushed ” the newcomer. Wharton dodged them both. Then he tried to argue with them. ‘Look here, I’m not tryin’ to get you!” he called out from the shadows. ‘“ I’m just givin’ you some good advice!” “* Like hell you are!” was growled at him. The two men came at him again, secure in numbers and evidently purposing to quiet him without the use of firearms. Wharton realized that this was no mild encounter. And he was not up to his usual form. GO DOOLK C@